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Mr. Pendanski looked at it again.
“See, you can even see all of its little bones,” said Stanley.
“Interesting,” said Mr. Pendanski. “Let me have your canteen.”
Stanley handed it to him. Mr. Pendanski filled it, then returned it.
“So do I get the rest of the day off?”
“What for?”
“You know, you said if I found something interesting, the Warden would give me the day off.”
Mr. Pendanski laughed as he gave the fossil back to Stanley. “Sorry, Stanley. The Warden isn’t interested in fossils.”
“Let me see that,” said Magnet, taking the rock from Stanley.
Stanley continued to stare at Mr. Pendanski. “Hey, Zig, dig this rock.”
“Cool,” said Zigzag.
Stanley saw his fossil being passed around.
“I don’t see nothing,” said X-Ray. He took off his glasses, wiped them on his dirty clothes, and put them back on.
“See, look at the little fishy,” said Armpit.
11
Stanley returned to his hole. It wasn’t fair. Mr. Pendanski had even said his fossil was interesting. He slammed his shovel into the ground and pried up another piece of earth.
After a while, he noticed X-Ray had come by and was watching him dig.
“Hey, Caveman, let me talk to you a second,” X-Ray said.
Stanley put down his shovel and stepped up out of his hole.
“Say, listen,” said X-Ray. “If you find something else, give it to me, okay?”
Stanley wasn’t sure what to say. X-Ray was clearly the leader of the group, and Stanley didn’t want to get on his bad side.
“You’re new here, right?” said X-Ray. “I’ve been here for almost a year. I’ve never found anything. You know, my eyesight’s not so good. No one knows this, but you know why my name’s X-Ray?”
Stanley shrugged one shoulder.
“It’s pig latin for Rex. That’s all. I’m too blind to find anything.”
Stanley tried to remember how pig latin worked.
“I mean,” X-Ray went on, “why should you get a day off when you’ve only been here a couple of days? If anybody gets a day off, it should be me. That’s only fair, right?”
“I guess,” Stanley agreed.
X-Ray smiled. “You’re a good guy, Caveman.”
Stanley picked up his shovel.
The more he thought about it, the more he was glad that he agreed to let X-Ray have anything he might find. If he was going to survive at Camp Green Lake, it was far more important that X-Ray think he was a good guy than it was for him to get one day off. Besides, he didn’t expect to find anything anyway. There probably wasn’t anything “of interest” out there, and even if there was, he’d never been what you could call lucky.
